


Warm Words

by raendown



Category: Naruto
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-08
Updated: 2017-09-08
Packaged: 2018-12-25 10:24:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12033945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raendown/pseuds/raendown
Summary: Hot night, cool laughter, and words that mean more for what goes unsaid.





	Warm Words

It was a hot evening. The kind of night that left her skin sticky and her hair drooping - and no matter how much powder she saw Ino continue to use her nose was still shiny. Sakura laughed at her friend in that lazy way that let hot air puff weakly from between her parted lips, nose scrunching in amusement as she laid herself out on the grass beside Shikamaru’s hip. 

Sakura said nothing as Shikamaru played absently with the candy floss strands of her hair. It was too hot for even that much contact but still she let him, couldn’t bear to tell him to stop. His blunt nails dragged across her scalp every so often to relieve the itch that sweat and a long day’s work had left behind. Sakura hummed under his ministrations, breathing out a chuckle and breathing in the sounds of a village at peace. 

“So then of course Naruto says he wants to help,” Shikamaru was saying. It wasn’t clear if he was talking to just her or Ino and Kiba as well. The four of them were all that was left of the Konoha Eleven tonight. Everyone else had already made their way home. “Kakashi-sama tried to tell him no - he’s just not ready to handle that kind of delicate correspondence yet - but of course the idiot wants to learn everything yesterday!” 

Kiba chuckled and slapped his knee while Ino rolled her eyes. They all knew how impatient their sunny friend was when it came to learning new things. Oh sure he put in the work and never gave up until he accomplished what he set out to do. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to complain the whole time. Loudly.

Sakura watched through half-lidded eyes as Shikamaru went on about the disaster Naruto’s latest attempt at diplomacy had created. Her eyes followed every shape his lips created, memorized every twitch of his brows and each shifting of his jaw. His hair was out of its usual ponytail, brushing the tops of his shoulders, and she drank in the rare sight like ice cold rum, heat and relief and just the slightest hints of haze all flowing through her every time he tilted his head. It took a few seconds for her to realize he had stopped talking, looking down at her with an expectant expression. 

“You asked me something,” she mumbled. “I wasn’t listening.”

“Bah. Troublesome woman. You never listen to a word I say.”

His words would have stung if he had meant them seriously. She knew very well he didn’t but she pressed her bottom lip out anyway. 

“That’s not fair at all, Shika. Who’s the one that always has an ear for you when you need to complain about Naruto’s latest fuck up?” She wanted to hum with pleasure as his fingers dragged through her hair again but held on to the pout instead. Shikamaru gave her a pointed look. 

“Who’s the one who always has an ear for  _you_  when you need to complain about the hospital’s latest fuck up?”

“That’s not fair, Shika,” she insisted. “You’re not supposed to have a counter-argument. You’re supposed to let me win!” 

Ino crowed with laughter, falling over in to Kiba’s shoulder and raising her water bottle in salute. Sakura barely heard her, too entranced with the way Shikamaru’s eyes pinned her to the ground as though stitched down with one of his shadows. 

“Why?” he asked. “Because you’re a girl?” Her pout deepened. 

“I’m a  _woman_.”

“All you are to me is trouble,” Shikamaru insisted in a dry voice.

With a low squawk of indignation, Sakura made a very serious attempt to roll away and sit up. The heat of summer that had settled in her bones weighed her down and made her movements sluggish. She had accomplished no more than to roll slightly to one side and get a quarter of the way in to a crunch before Shikamaru’s hand on her shoulder pulled her back down to the ground. 

“Wait.” He chuckled. “I didn’t mean that. Please, come back.” He was laughing now, a sound she’d always thought reminded her of sweet autumn nights wrapped in a blanket reading books by the fire. A laugh that was cool and warm at the same time in all the right ways. 

Sakura let herself be flopped back down; half because she was so full of summer and laziness and weight that getting up seemed like so much trouble, half because she’d do anything just to sit still and listen to that laugh. He could bring her home from the hardest missions just to hear that laugh one more time. 

Blunt fingernails dragged along her scalp as Shikamaru ran his hand through her hair yet again, fanning it back out around her head as it had been before. When she looked up at him his eyes blazed, hotter than the air that painted her with sweat and full of promises she didn’t have the words to ask for. He smiled and Sakura drifted away from the nighttime, forgot Ino and Kiba were there, forgot her long hard day, forgot everything that didn’t exist in his sharp gaze. 

“You’re more than worth the trouble,” he murmured.

It wasn’t a big grand confession. It wasn’t love poetry on perfumed stationary. But it was heartfelt words that meant more to her than any other hasty  _I love you_  ever could have. He always did manage to find the words that she lost. 

Sakura smiled and let her eyes fall closed. She could hear Ino yelling and waving her arms around, telling her to do something. Kiba muttered about idiots who didn’t know how to respond properly to confessions. It did nothing but make her huff out one more lazy laugh. 

“Troublesome,” she murmured.


End file.
